A jowl is the lower part of a person's or animal's cheek, especially the fleshy area along the jawline that can hang down a bit. You might notice jowls on an older dog like a bloodhound or basset hound, where loose skin droops from the jaw, giving it that distinctive droopy-faced look. In people, jowls become more noticeable with age as skin loses its tightness and begins to sag along the jaw.

The word often appears in descriptions of characters in books: a grumpy shopkeeper with sagging jowls, or a bulldog with heavy jowls that shake when it runs. When someone is described as jowly, it means they have particularly pronounced jowls.

You might also hear the phrase cheek by jowl, which means very close together or side by side. If students are packed cheek by jowl in an assembly, they're squeezed right up against each other. The phrase creates a funny image of faces pressed so close that cheeks and jowls are touching.